College football: Hawkeyes enter new season with plenty of questions

IOWA CITY — There was plenty of items to discuss for Kirk Ferentz as he stepped to the podium at Kinnick Stadium on Friday for his 26th Iowa Football Media Day as head coach.

New conference rivals, a new offensive coordinator and how to maintain success in the ever-changing world of college football were among the questions posed to the all-time winningest coach in the history of Hawkeye football.

Ferentz talked about a season that begins with a lot of intrigue as Iowa looks to contend for a third Big Ten west division championship in the past four seasons. While the Hawkeyes will be facing a stiffer challenge to claiming a conference title with four new programs (Oregon, Washington, USC, UCLA) joining the chase, Ferentz is leaning on several returning players to bring a sense of stability heading into the 2024-25 season.

“Things haven’t changed much since we last talk. We’re a pretty veteran team,” Ferentz said. “There will be some things that will be different. Obviously, having a new offensive coordinator in with new schemes. We had a couple of different changes to our staff overall that the players at still getting used to.

“The great thing about a new season are there are new opportunities. The consistency in camp has been pretty good. We’re not where we want to be, but I like the effort. The leadership has been really good. The older players have done a good job setting the pace. We are a different team than we were in April. A lot has changed since then, but I feel like we’re on a good path.”

Cade McNamara will certainly be key in determining the expectations for success this season. The Michigan transfer led Iowa to three wins in the first four games of last season at quarterback before suffering a season-ending injury in a 23-16 win over Michigan State, forcing the Hawkeyes to grind out six wins in their…


Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/college-football-hawkeyes-enter-season-014600434.html

Author : Ottumwa Courier, Iowa

Publish date : 2024-08-10 01:46:00

Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.